How do we hear God?

God delights to communicate with us.  He loves to answer our questions.  He conveys His approval and acceptance of us.  He guides us when we do not know what to do.  He brings light when something is bothering us.  There are no shadows in His goodness.  He loves us to seek Him and pursue Him, and He delights even more to reveal Himself to us.

There are many promises in the Word of God that highlight God’s desire to speak to us.  The Scriptures say that He will guide us, give us wisdom, communicate with us (Romans 8:14; James 1:5; 1 Corinthians 2:10-12).

So how does God communicate with us today? 

1. His sheep recognize His voice.
   

Most of the time, as described above, God speaks to us through our own thoughts.  So how can we learn to recognize and identify His voice?  I could be in a room with a hundred people, all of them speaking out loud, and I would instantly recognize the voice of my husband, Tony (and not just because he would be the only one speaking with a British accent!)  What is the reason for this?  I love to spend time with Tony.  We spend hours enjoying each other’s company.  In human terms, there is no one else I would rather spend time with.  Over the thirty five years that we have been married, it has come to the point where we regularly think the same thoughts simultaneously and complete each other’s sentences. 

God longs for an intimate relationship with us too.  As we spend time with Him, we learn to recognize His voice.  As we read His word, we come to understand His ways and His thoughts.  There is no substitute for time spent in His presence, adoring Him, loving Him, meditating on His Word and His character and listening to what He has to say to us. 

I learned to recognize how God speaks to me many years ago.  At that time I used to do a lot of counseling.  Several times a week people would come to me with their problems.  In order to cut down on the amount of time it took to get to the root of their problem and to find a solution, I developed the habit of praying for them before they came.  I would empty my mind of my own thoughts by waiting on God, and I would pray for them, often in tongues.  Then I would write down the thoughts that came into my mind.  Later, after the counseling session was over, I would go back to my prayer journal and see if I had written anything relevant to their situation.  Most of the time I had.  Obviously not everything I wrote was relevant, but usually, 85-90% of the time, a good portion of it specifically addressed their problem.  I would note this down.  As this happened more and more frequently, I gained a confidence that God would speak to me in that way.

[Oral Roberts addresses this use of speaking in tongues in his book, A Daily Guide to Miracles.  In a section entitled, “I speak to God; God speaks to me,” Roberts describes that when we pray in tongues, we are speaking to God.  We can trust that the thoughts that we have while this is going on are God speaking back to us.]

Mark Virkler also talks about God speaking to us.  Many years ago I read his book entitled Dialog with God.  In it he describes a way of learning to listen to God.  One of the things he writes about is the art of journaling.  If we deliberately quiet our hearts before God, waiting in His presence, God will speak to us.  When we have entered that place of knowing we are in His presence, where our minds are not distracted by a myriad of thoughts about the affairs of our day, then we write down the thoughts that come into our minds without attempting to make any sense of them until we have finished writing.  When the stream of thoughts comes to an end, we then go over what we have written.  Does it make sense?  Is it in accord with Scriptural principle? 

I use this pattern frequently.  Usually I have spent time in the Word and time worshipping God.  I will then quiet my mind by waiting on God, bringing every thought captive to Him so that I am no longer working with my preconceived ideas.  Then I will write down a question.  It may be as simple as, “Is there anything want to say to me today?”  Or maybe it will be more specific—“What do you want me to do about this situation?”  Then I start to write down the thoughts that come into my mind.  Usually I will write for several minutes.  When the flow of writing stops, I go over what I have written to see if it is relevant.

My experience is that much of the time, what I write is in general good, but fairly non-specific.  It is Scriptural, but not life-changing.  But sometimes it brings clear revelation from the Lord, often about the Scriptures I have been meditating on.  And occasionally it is a very specific word.  For example, a few months ago, I wrote that it appeared as though He was warning me that I was going to experience a very specific kind of spoken attack that I would not be expecting and from someone that I thought was a friend.  He also stated that it would rebound to His glory.  Within three days, the contents of a phone call absolutely shocked me.  But I was prepared.  It meant that I was able to deal with the situation it represented in a more godly fashion.

Quite often God speaks through a picture.  At a personal level, I tend to be more auditory than visual.  I tend to think in words rather than pictures.  But often I will catch a glimpse of a picture as I am praying.  As I think about what I have seen, concepts come into my mind and the meaning becomes clear and relevant.

It does not take long interacting with the Lord in this way before one becomes familiar with the way the Holy Spirit speaks and learns to trust the quiet whisper in the heart.

 

Comments

[John White]

Very helpful examples, Felicity! You are such a good model of this. I've learned a lot from you in this area. In one sense it is so simple but I continue to be amazed it is not the normal experience for so many Christians.

Rather than just talk about listening, we've found it transformational to actually do this with people at every opportunity. Mary Geegh describes this practice in her powerful little book "God Guides". (Experiential learning vs theoretical learning)

Then, we reinforce it at every level. First, with our alone time with God each day. Then, with our daily CO2s (churches of two which includes marriages). Then, with our house churches. And, finally, with our regional leadership teams (MRTs). In each situation we are seeking to follow in Jesus' steps: "I do nothing on my own initiative. I only do what I see the Father doing." (Jn. 5:19)

It's been especially fun to see how this works out in house churches. We teach each church to simply ask the Lord one question each week: "Jesus, what do you want to say to your church today." The group takes 20-30 minutes to listen and write what they hear in response to that question. And, then, they come back together to share what they heard. New Christians and children often are the best "hearers" in this situation. What we are discovering is that Jesus is really quite good at leading individual churches. (Who would have thought?!) As we listen and obey, everything else seems to flow naturally - Bible study, prayer, intimate fellowship, mission, etc. And, it makes starting new churches quite simple.

Here's a short video on how one family is putting this into practice. Very fun to see how the 7 and 10 year olds are "getting it"! http://storiesfromtherevolution.blogspot.com/2010/02/c02-and-family.html